Global mobile data traffic surges, more expected

The amount of data flitting back and forth across the globe on various devices shot up 70 per cent last year compared with 2011, according to Cisco Systems' latest annual report tracking the trend.

Cisco attributed the rise in large part to the increasing number of wireless devices accessing mobile networks worldwide.

"By 2017, there will be 8.6 billion handheld or personal mobile-ready devices and 1.7 billion machine-to-machine connections," from global-positioning systems in cars to patient health-monitoring devices, the company reported.

Here are some of its other findings:

"Last year's mobile data traffic was nearly 12 times the size of the entire global internet in 2000."